- does the difficulty affect the storytelling?

- is there a time limit to how many days I can spend exploring?

- does your MC ever go into battle?

- should you not go into the mountains at lower levels, i.e. just stick to the road? I've noticed fights are tougher in the mountains, oh boy.

This is a fantastic game, really glad I checked it out.

Here's my thoughts. Sure. If you fail constantly, due to it being more difficult, that'll change things. :P Actually Conquistadors is interesting that failure doesn't often lead to Game Over, it just alters the story. So that's kind of a legit answer.

Otherwise, I don't think it affects anything directly, but I'm not sure. I don't think there's a technical time limit, but your resources get strained after a certain point. It's not like a typical RPG where you can just grind treasure, then buy from a trader who has an unlimited supply of goods. Nope. Your MC can act as an out-of-combat doctor, or use his stats to influence events, but that's about it. He's more like a phantom than a character. Mountains are fine, just make sure you have a good supply of food and medicine before tackling them.
As far as fights go, I guess it depends on if it's simply too difficult, though I myself never found a need to level-up anybody before exploring them.

Speaking of "sticking to the road". It's worth noting that the jungle is easier to camp in than on the road, due to guarding and hunting being less difficult. So if I'm travelling via road, I make sure to veer off 1 or 2 tiles into the jungle before camping.

Could be you encountered the fight before you had some barricades or traps available? Having those available makes fights much easier, especially those mountain ones since you can block off the enemy. Or did that sneaky warrior catch you off guard (the one that comes at you from your left flank - I didn't notice him at first!).

That being said I think the mountain guys are supposed to be kind of tough - but there are MUCH tougher fights ahead (I won't spoil them though).

Also as MadOverlord said the game has so many branching storylines that it accounts for practically everything. Short of having a major mutiny or getting everyone slaughtered, you can lose every single battle and the game still goes on. Actually if you really wanted to, you could go around collecting healing plants (they respawn eventually) and sell them to the merchants. IMO that's a pretty lame way to play though, and you shouldn't need to do it, even if you want to explore the whole map. Besides, there are no experience points to be had from grinding.

How much your resources get strained (and how soon) depend heavily on how many points you've put into Survival and how many hunters you have. Food can be a big expense if not managed carefully. That said, fishing when you can and killing every wild boar you see should help a lot, and on Normal there should be plenty of the latter running around.

Just be aware that 95% in guarding does mean you WILL have guarding failures 5% of the time, so the longer you roam around the greater the chance of a guard failure triggering. ;)

I think this fight is supposed to happen before or while you're making your way to the Mine, and when I first started the game, that was where I went. Like I said, I couldn't beat those guys at that level, so I reloaded and went a different way, but when I did eventually go to the Mine for the Esteban quest, the fight was so much easier, and I didn't even use any traps etc; I think having equipment helped, and also some people were higher level at that point.

All fights thus far have been pretty good, actually, I think because I spent my first 70 days or so exploring; I think I got most of my initial experience by charting the coast and outskirts, and a bit of the mountains.

Haven't had a problem with resources, but I've noticed that the more you have, the more likely you are to lose it if you don't guard well enough :] Very thoughtful game.

Thanks for the info, though, good to know I don't have to win every fight; losing now and again just adds character, I think :p